What AI Actually Replaced in My Creative Work

The Short Version

AI didn’t replace my creative work. It took over the admin. Repetitive tasks, data analysis, and a starting point for research all free up my time to do the things I actually enjoy–photography, designing, and writing. The actual creative stuff. This post is specifically about Claude, but I imagine it applies to any AI tool.

Who Is AI Actually Replacing?

Nobody. The folks who use AI to generate their entire Instagram feed or website aren’t the people who were going to pay industry standard rates for creative work anyway. Maybe they’re a small start-up without a marketing budget. Maybe they’re busy focusing on their core business and just need to get the information out there quickly. Regardless of their reason, good organic human design will always be worth the money. I suppose that’s a long way of saying it all depends on how someone uses AI in their work.

The Admin Angle

As a designer, do I occasionally use it to spit out a graphic if I’m short on time? Yes. The infographics in this post are all Claude’s work. Infographics aren’t my thing. Do I use it to write full posts? I have, experimentally, but I enjoy writing so letting AI write for me takes some of the fun out of it. Do I use AI features when editing photos? Sometimes. Lightroom’s object removal tool can be a lifesaver. I’m not a fan of the AI presets, but I can see where they’d be useful starting points for some folks.

The real benefit of AI for me is the admin side. The monotonous stuff that takes time away from what I actually enjoy doing. AI should be the assistant, not the producer.

Client Project Sync

I have a freelance client that uses Google Sheets to track projects. I started by copying and pasting from that sheet into my project management system in Notion. Eventually, I created a Claude skill to read the Google Sheet, find the lines with my name and a specific status (new projects), then create the Notion records in my project management system. What took me roughly fifteen minutes a day now gets done in 30 seconds. Fifteen minutes doesn’t sound like much, but it adds up over time.

NAS/File System Cleanup

I had decades worth of files sitting in my home folder on my NAS drive. Literally projects that I did back in the early 2000s. When I’d switch computers, I’d just dump what I thought was important into an “Archive” folder and tell myself I’d clean it up later.

Spoiler: I did not clean it up later. Ever.

I’d had Claude help me clean up and organize my Downloads folder before, so I decided to give it a shot at these Archive folders. It wasn’t allowed to make any changes initially. I wanted it to traverse the folders, find duplicates, categorize everything, then come back to me with a plan/suggestion. It took a solid morning of back and forth, but the end result is a well-organized and efficient Archive folder. Claude’s ability to SHA-256 verify every file to find actual duplicates and not just revisions made the job so much easier than me going through and visually finding and checking every single file. There were hundreds of duplicates. It would’ve taken me days to go through all of them, and I probably would’ve missed quite a few.

General Data Review

Any time I need to analyze some inconsequential data, I just give it to Claude. Blog stats, social media stats, road trip data… Claude can make sense of it faster than I can, and can present it visually so I can scan it quickly.

Network Uptime Review

I recently switched to a new internet provider, and I was curious about uptime. I have a script sitting on my NAS that pings Google’s DNS servers every few minutes and logs the result to a CSV file. Once a month or so, I give Claude the CSV files to see if there are any trends.

Ninety-day network uptime report showing 99.97% combined uptime across two DNS providers, an outage timeline with a correlated local outage, and one latency spike anomaly detected in the ping logs

Style Guides

When I’m working with a new client, I have Claude take a look at their existing creative–website, logo, design files. Claude then creates a PDF style guide reference with color HEX values, font families, and (if there is enough existing copy on their website) the general voice of the company. If I write any copy for the updated website, Claude can tell me if it follows the existing brand voice. That PDF is a great reference while I’m creating whatever it is I’m creating for the client.

Outlining and Proofreading

I have a tendency to ramble when I write. Hey–I said I liked to write, not that I was great at it. So before I sit down to write anything, I give claude my idea, thoughts, and general word vomit for the post and have Claude give me some guardrails in the form of an outline. It keeps me from bouncing back and forth between cohesive thoughts.

Once I’m done writing, I have Claude proofread it. It goes beyond spell check to tell me if I’ve rambled, if I’m going too in-depth on something and turning it into a snooze-fest, or if it just doesn’t match the voice of things I’ve written before. It’ll make suggestions. Sometimes I ignore the suggestions. I know what I want to say, and I generally write the way I talk, so sometimes it’s a little random. I’m cool with that. Once in a while, though, Claude catches something that I do want to change.

Fact Checking

This one is probably my favorite. I’ll preface this by saying the obvious thing. Don’t just trust what any AI tells you. Fact-check the fact-check. I created a skill that follows certain rules for this one and cites its sources. I’ll add more details about the skills below.

Product Reviews

Similar to the fact-check skill, I have a product review skill. If I’m thinking of buying something, I’ll give Claude the URL to the product and it’ll go out and grab reviews, pricing, and other useful information and present it all to me in an easy to digest format. What would take me a half hour of Googling takes Claude a minute or less.

Health Data Correlation

This one has nothing to do with creativity. It’s just me being a geek. I realize not everyone is comfortable giving AI access to health data. I have Claude analyze several different data points and tell me if there are any trends, anomalies, or anything else worth looking at. This has to be done on my iPhone or iPad–Claude desktop doesn’t have access to Apple Health data. This goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyway–AI is NOT a substitute for talking to your doctor. But if the reports show some kind of trend, it might be worth showing your doc.

Eight months of health data showing heart rate variability rising as resting heart rate falls, daylight exposure tracking with daily step count through the Montana seasons, and one outlier night of under two hours of sleep against an otherwise steady average

Skills Are My Favorite Tool

I forget things all the time. Especially things I’m not repeating on a daily basis. So rather than try to remember myself how I want Claude to perform a certain function, I create skills to ensure repeatable results.

Fact Check Skill

There are five standing rules on this one.

It’s only allowed to pull from reputable sources.
It’s not allowed to use any unintentional bias in my prompt when searching or coming back with a response.
If the prompt is biased, and I’m wrong, it’ll just tell me point blank.
It cites all of its sources so I can read through them myself.
It’s not allowed to guess. If it can’t find the information I’m looking for, it’ll say so.

Product Research Skill

This one does 15–25 separate search passes, (professional reviews, retailer reviews, long-term forum complaints, CPSC recalls, warranty reputation, price comparison,) before coming back with a comprehensive summary. If there are complaints about a product, it has to be specific about what that is.

Client Records Skill

The important part on this one is that it never gives Claude write access to the Google Sheet. Multiple people use that Sheet, so accidentally messing it up would be a shit show. There’s another small guardrail. If it looks at the sheet and sees more than 10 new projects, it’ll stop and ask me to confirm. I generally only have 5 or 6 new jobs each day, so if there are suddenly 15 there might be a glitch. Or a long night. Either way I want it called out.

What Stays in My Lane

Actual design. Claude saves me time by doing the research: Determining brand colors, fonts, style. I get to spend my time actually designing the thing, whatever it is.

Writing. Claude is an excellent assistant, but I think at this point we can all tell when something is written by AI. And it’s not the em-dashes. I’ve been using them for decades because like I said–I write like I speak. Pauses are important.

The human touch. AI is great with hard data. It’s ok at summarizing a lot of information into something more palatable. But it can’t replace the human experience. If two people experience the same thing, they’ll both write about it differently. They’ll take different photos. They’ll remember different aspects. AI can’t replace our perspective. It can’t articulate the actual experience. Like it or not, we have all the feelings.

Split infographic titled Where the Line Actually Is, showing checkable tasks like color sampling and source verification on one side and creative judgment calls like typography and voice on the other

The Math

AI saves time. For me. I know people have all kinds of different uses for it. (Some better than others.) I’m a fan of efficiency. If AI can be a tool that opens up more free time for me to do things I enjoy, I’m all for it. Tools are good. Hand the bullshit to Claude, grab your camera, and go create something human.